Google your username!

Don’t just assume that people who are searching for you online will only search for your given name exactly as you have it on your resume. A savvy employer or media professional will Google everything related to your name, including nicknames, email addresses and usernames. If you use the same username for everything, Google it to see what comes up.

For instance, I recently Googled the Twitter/AIM/Gmail username of a colleague. This led to his Twitter, snarky comments left on a chat transcript about a professional presentation, as well as Digg, StumbleUpon and random forum posts.

If the results you see when you Google your username or email address are all public facing, professional accounts, then you have nothing to worry about. However, if your social media history is spotty or you’ve been using the same username online for a really long time, you might see some things that you’d rather not show off to a potential employer.

Cleaning up:
– Log into old accounts and change details to those radically different than your real ones (age, birthday, sex, occupation). This creates reasonable doubt that the account belongs to you.
– Choose a personal username and a professional username, and never cross the streams.
– Sign up for some new sites with the username you’re trying to tidy up, and update those profiles or forums frequently for a few weeks. Hopefully you’ll see them rise in your username search results.